Universal—release this double feature on DVD! THEN maybe we’ll visit your studios!


£70,000 which would not have included the fees of Protelco, Gerry Fernback and myself. I don’t exactly remember the budget of THE PROJECTED MAN but it was substantially less.


Now, a funny thing happened involving the hand-chopping scene in ISLAND OF TERROR, which was not in the film when I screened it for Hi Martin. I had previously given Universal a copy of the shooting script to keep their interest high and because they wanted to be sure they would have no censorship problems. At the end of the screening, Martin asked me what happened to that shot. I wasn’t going to lie about it, I said, “Frankly, I wasn’t happy with it. I didn’t think it would matter if we left it out; in fact, I thought it would look more horrific if you don’t actually see it.” He asked, “If we want it, can we get it?” I said, “Well, you’re certainly entitled to it, if you buy the picture for the United States and you want that shot included.” He said, “Have it sent


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over from England, and let the people at the studio in California look at it.” Well, they looked at it and they said, “Yes, we want it”! At that time, it was actually surprising that Universal got that shot past the MPAA, that Universal was not forced to cut it. So that’s how it came to be in the film. I still think it spoils the mood. When I see the film today with an audience, somebody usually lets out a laugh when they see that shot, because it’s so obviously phony. In horror films, sometimes if something’s happening offscreen, and you know it’s happening but you don’t see it, it’s actually more horrifying than if it’s put on the screen in front of you. Especially if what’s put on the screen in front of you looks amateurish and doesn’t work properly!


I saw both movies again recently, in prepa- ration for this article. The pre-credits sequence in ISLAND OF TERROR was, I thought, a little bit too long and slow, but everybody was doing


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